Page:A dictionary of the Book of Mormon.pdf/52

Alma, the younger. , to the place where his people were awaiting the decision of the Nephites. Here they were ministered to and comforted by Alma and others, after which they resumed their march to the land designated for their future abode.

We pass over the next few years of Alma's life, during which period he was laboring with his usual zeal and devotion, to the latter portion of the seventeenth year of the judges (B. C. 75). It was then that Korihor, the anti-Christ, appeared. His pernicious doctrines savor much of certain classes of modern religious delusion, but his main arguments were directed against the advent and atonement of the Redeemer. From land to land he journeyed among the Nephites, spreading his false theories and notions. But as he claimed that as he taught so he believed, the law could not touch him, for it was strictly forbidden in the Nephite constitution that any one should be punished on account of his belief; freedom of conscience was guaranteed to all. At last, not knowing what to do with him, as he was fomenting dissension and endangering the peace of the community, the local officers sent him to Alma and the chief judge, for them to decide in the matter. When brought before these officers he continued, with great swelling words of blasphemy, to ridicule the holy principles of the Gospel, and to revile the servants of God, falsely accusing them, among other things, of glutting themselves out of the labors of the people. In Alma's answer to this charge we have a pleasing insight into his private life. He said: “Thou knowest that we do not glut ourselves upon the labors of this people, for behold, I have labored, even from the commencement of the reign of the judges until now, with mine own hands for my support, notwithstanding my many travels around about the land to declare the word of God unto my people; and notwithstanding the many labors I have performed in the